The ASBC&D is an international association of bookplate artists & collectors since 1922! Building global friendships through the exchange of art.
The ASBC&D & Victoria University Take Great Pleasure in Announcing
Our Annual Bookplate Design Competition 2025
“Ossi di seppia • Cuttlefish Bones” by Eugenio Montale (1896-1981)
The year 2025 marks 100 years since “Ossi di seppia • Cuttlefish Bones” was published by the Italian Nobel Laureate, Eugenio Montale (1896-1981)
Sponsored by Victoria University, Ira Block Foundation, and the ASBC&D
Logo calligraphy by Joke van den Brandt
The Centenary Celebration of Ossi di Seppia or Cuttlefish Bones (1925) written by Eugenio Montale “Ossi di seppia • Cuttlefish Bones” Bookplate Design Competition
The year 2025 marks 100 years since “Ossi di seppia • Cuttlefish Bones” was published by the Italian Nobel Laureate Eugenio Montale (1896-1981)
“Sit the noon out, pale and lost in thought
beside a blazing garden wall,
hear, among the thorns and brambles,
snakes rustle, blackbirds catcall”
The announcement for next year’s competition celebrates the genius of Italian poet and Nobel Laureate Eugenio Montale. In 1925 he published “Ossi di Seppia • Cuttlefish Bones”. Rules are the same as in the past. The deadline is April 15th, 2025
Montale’s work, especially his first poetry collection “Ossi di seppia • Cuttlefish Bones”, which appeared in 1925, shows him as an anti-fascist who felt detached from contemporary life and found solace and refuge in the solitude of nature.
A few links to Eugenio Montale who won the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1975. He was one of the finest literary figures of the 20th century.
1) Brittanica – https://www.britannica.com/biography/Eugenio-Montale
2) Poets.org – https://poets.org/poet/eugenio-montale
3) The Nobel Prize – https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/literature/1975/montale/facts
4) Wikipedia – https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eugenio_Montale
For Competition Rules, please visit – https://bookplate.org
The brief to the designer should include a general and specific text.
For the general text, this is the Prize motivation from the Swedish Academic for the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1975
“…for his distinctive poetry which, with great artistic sensitivity, has interpreted human values under the sign of an outlook on life with no illusions”.
For the specific text, this poem from Ossi di seppia (the collection was published 100 years ago in 1925, his debut collection), captures his poetics quite well and should inspire good designs. You may discover that many Montale poems are abstract and impenetrable.
“Ossi di seppia • Cuttlefish Bones” is the first poem Montale published, when he was 20, and the English translation is by his US eminent translator and publisher, Jonathan Galassi.
Sit the noon out, pale and lost in thought
beside a blazing garden wall,
hear, among the thorns and brambles,
snakes rustle, blackbirds catcall.
In the cracked earth or on the vetch,
spy the red ants’ files
now breaking up, now knitting
on top of little piles.
Observe between branches the far-off
throbbing of sea scales,
while the cicadas’ wavering screaks
rise from the bald peaks.
And walking in the dazzling sun,
feel with sad amazement
how all life and its torment
consists in following along a wall
with broken bottle shards embedded in the top.
* * * * *
Here is another poem, more abstract but equally plausible as a choice of text. The translation is by one of Galassi’s predecessors as Montale translators into English, another great US intellectual, William Arrowsmith:
Don’t ask me for words that might define
our formless soul, publish it
in letters of fire, and set it shining,
lost crocus in a dusty field.
Ah, that man so confidently striding,
friend to others and himself, careless
that the dog day’s sun might stamp
his shadow on a crumbling wall!
Don’t ask me for formulas to open worlds
for you: all I have are gnarled syllables,
branch-dry. All I can tell you now is this:
what we are not, what we do not want.
Montale’s work, especially his first poetry collection “Ossi di Seppia • Cuttlefish Bones” which appeared in 1925, shows him as an anti-fascist who felt detached from contemporary life and found solace and refuge in the solitude of nature.
COMPETITION RULES
1.- The Competition is open to all artists. Participation is free of charge. Please include your email address and physical mailing address. Please send scans of your entries that will be used in our publications (300+ dpi – “jpeg” scans are preferable). Send your bookplate scans, CV, personal statement, photo portrait to info@bookplate.org. The original prints should be sent to the address below. We will use this information in future publications and on our website.
2.- Only entries made utilizing techniques approved by FISAE (international association of ex libris societies) for original graphic art prints will be accepted for the Competition. In other words, just about any printmaking technique imaginable! The only requirement is that your bookplate entries must fit inside a book. The words Ex Libris or The Books Of or The Library Of plus the owner’s name. There is some flexibility on the dimensions as we understand books come in many sizes. If you have questions, please write to info@bookplate.org.
3.- No indications or markings of other competitions must be present. The following must be written in pencil on the reverse side: surname, first name, email, and the address of the artist. The dimensions of the image area and technique used. Written in pencil in the lower margin under the image on the front of your print(s), please include the edition title, number, date, and your initials, signature, and/or trademark (stamp).
4.- Each artist may submit a maximum of five entries, each of which must have at least five (5) signed copies. Four copies will be held in the ASBC&D Library collection and used for various exhibitions & publications. One will be in the collection of Victoria University at Wellington, New Zealand. The exhibitions online and in-person will present the artists’ ex libris prints in the “Ossi di Seppia • Cuttlefish Bones” Bookplate Competition 2025 to a wide-ranging international audience.
5.- All Ex Libris prints submitted will be used for exhibition(s), for publication by the ASBC&D, and our member institutions. Simultaneously, we are planning a traveling exhibition in the USA that will begin with the exhibitions at American Bookbinders Museum and the Book Club of California in San Francisco, California.
6.- Entries will not be returned. The American Society of Bookplate Collectors & Designers and Victoria University at Wellington, New Zealand have designated prizes to be announced shortly. The entries, once accepted by the Jury, will be selected for publication in the Exhibition Catalog. The winners will be announced in the Bookplate Buzz newsletter during July 2025 after all entries have come in. Prizes will be announced at this time. Until this day all the artists will be strictly forbidden to publish or post on the web or social networks the works sent for the competition, under the penalty of being excluded from the competition. The bookplate entries should be sent via Registered Mail or Priority Mail (with tracking) by 15 April 2025 to the following address. Entries must be “postmarked” by April 15th, 2025 and sent to:
Regular Mail:
“Cuttlefish Bones” Bookplate Competition, P.O. Box 14964, Tucson, AZ, USA, 85732-4964
Special Mail: If you choose to use a “private” mail carrier such as DHL, FEDEX, or UPS please use this address:
“Cuttlefish Bones” Bookplate Competition, 255 North Rosemont Blvd, Suite 14964, Tucson, Arizona, USA 85711-3101
At least 100 works will be reproduced in the catalog. All the artists will receive an electronic file with the works admitted to the competition. Participation in the Competition implies full acceptance of the above rules.
For further information, please contact: info@bookplate.org